Modern Masculinity & Men’s Work: Jason Lange on Purpose, Relationships & Emotional Strength | Jenny’s safe space

Host (Jenny's safe space): Welcome back to Genitafe Space where we explore powerful conversations about growth, healing and transformation. Today's guest is JC Lack, men's embodiment coach, group facilitator and evolutionary guide. Jason helps men develop deeper clarity in their purpose, relationship and emotional lives through embodiment work and men's growth. He is a satisfied no more Ms. Nice Guy Coach and has trained with influential teachers including John Wayland, Dr. Robert Blofer, Trip Lanier and Ken Weber. Jackson believes one of the most important thing a man can do today is join a healthy men's group. And today we are diving into why. Jackson, you are welcome to Jenny Safe Space.

Jason Lange: Thanks so much for having me. Excited to be here.

Host (Jenny's safe space): Yeah. Welcome, Jesse. So, Jesse, you've shared that your own journey into men's work started after years of loneliness, discomfort in your body and struggles with relationships. So what was happening internally during that season of your life?

Jason Lange: Yeah, absolutely. So my journey into this work, like you said, started with my own journey. And like a lot of men, you know, I was raised to not know how to connect to what I was feeling inside. So what the emotions were in my body, what to do with the discomfort in my body. I was raised in a house of both physical and emotional neglect, meaning there just wasn't a lot of connection. So as I became a teenager and started to grow into a man, all I knew how to do was keep everything inside of me and really not share. And that's a struggle I think a lot of men suffer from these days in that from a young age, you know, we're taught to be tough, to be resilient, to not cry. And so all these challenging emotions inside of us, we just kind of lock up and never touch or ignore or try to steamroll with alcohol or weed or porn or masturbation or whatever that might be. And the consequence of that is more men than ever feel lonely and isolated, meaning they don't feel like they're connected in the way that people really know them and know what's going on inside. Instead feel like they have to perform all the time to be this kind of tough, successful guy. And so for me, that loneliness was quite crippling, both in terms of my inability to get into a romantic relationship and then my inability to talk about that even with the friends I did have.

Host (Jenny's safe space): So at what point did you realize you needed something deeper than surface level self improvement?

Jason Lange: Yeah, for me, it started in my late teen years. I was around 18 or 19 and I just had the sense that, wow, you know, know I was depressed I was anxious. I did not feel good in my day to day body, even though I tried to. And I realized there's got to be a better way. I was just like, there has to be a more easeful way to be alive than this. And it kind of started me on a journey of, okay, well, I'm going to transform and figure it out. And for me, it initially led me down a path, I think like a lot of men of studying philosophy and trying to understand the mind. Um, but thankfully that path eventually took me to the real work that did move the needle for me of men's groups, men's community, and particularly somatic work in those containers of learning how to get into my body, get connected to myself, and actually share that experience with other people.

Host (Jenny's safe space): Interesting. So men's group became transformational for you personally. So what did you experience there that changed your life? Was there something?

Jason Lange: Yeah. So one of the first, most potent men's groups that I experienced that really moved the needle for me that I often tell stories about was I was in a group and it was being led by an older male psychotherapist who had been in the the work for many, many years. And essentially within about 10 minutes of the group starting and it being my turn, which just means the attention was on me and he was guiding me and facilitating to help me get connected to what I was feeling. I ended up laying down on my back on the ground, my arms were pointed in the air and I was bawling, I was crying and I was yelling out, you know, hold me, hold me, where are you? And turns out that connected me to a very young infant toddler version of me that had been neglected by my mother and just not held and carried and touched in the ways I really needed. And I was shocked when I got up. I was like, what just happened there? I had been in therapy for over a year, but it was kind of more mental. And this connected me to something inside my body that I'd been carrying for decades at that point. And when I got up from that, I realized, wow, there's a lot I don't know. And just trying to figure this all out in my head isn't going to do it. So being in a somatic based men's group really changed things because it got me more in touch with myself, which then just gave me more choice. Rather than running around with this kind of shadowy infant inside of me that was desperate for touch and sometimes quite literally acted like a baby, I was able to step forward more as an adult man. And be clear about what my needs and wants were. So once I experienced that, I was hooked. And I've been in men's groups ever since.

Host (Jenny's safe space): It.

Jason Lange: You still there, Sam?

Host (Jenny's safe space): I'm so sorry about that. That was my network day.

Jason Lange: Sure.

Host (Jenny's safe space): Oh. So where were we?

Jason Lange: I just finished the story about kind of what transformed me about getting into a men's group.

Host (Jenny's safe space): Okay. So I think I got part of it. So. So why do you think so many men are starving for genuine connection but don't know how to ask for it?

Jason Lange: Yeah, this is a great question. And I think a lot of it has to do with how us men are trained to be in the culture of masculinity so many guys are raised in these days, which really, really teaches more than anything else, be tough, don't be invulnerable. And other men are competition. And if you share any vulnerability with them, it's. It's going to come at your detriment. They will ostracize you, bully you, etc. And that this starts with men from a very young age, even in, often in terms of how we're parented and parented different from girls of, you know, it's all about being tough and moving forward and getting back up. And this teaches men from a very young age essentially that whatever's happening in our bodies and by extension our hearts isn't important. And what's more important is that we override it with our head. Right. That's often what it means to be tough as a man is mind over matter in a lot of ways. And so the downstream consequence of this is men don't have the skills and tools needed to be relational, to create connection, to know how to talk about their emotions and talk about their inner world with other men by default. So many men just talk about the outer world, talk about things, sports, fixing things, media, politics. And it's not that those things are wrong to discuss with people, you know, we care about, but. But they don't get to the inner stuff about what it's like to be us, where we're in pain, what we want, what we're moving towards. And it turns out the thing that often very much connects us the most to other people are the things that are the most vulnerable for us to share. So men who have been trained not to be vulnerable don't share those things and then walk around feeling alone, disconnected, et cetera. And it's only being accelerated with just the direction our cultures are going in terms of more and more online mediated social media, virtual work. From home. These things, particularly in the west that are pretty big but starting to show up everywhere, that really creates these circumstances where many men don't have a whole lot of human connection around them. And I think more and more men's groups and men's community can be one of the ways and one of the pathways back from that.

Host (Jenny's safe space): Interesting. So you often talk about the old paradigms of masculinity no longer working. So what are some addicted ideas about being a man that are causing harm today?

Jason Lange: Yeah, that's great question. You know, we've talked about some of it already, that to be a man means to be tough, to be invulnerable, to never ask for help, to never show weakness. Where that still shows up these days are what I kind of call the three different archetypes that men gravitate towards. So kind of patterns of being. The first one's probably the oldest one and the one that gets the most attention in our culture. But you know, it's what we kind of just call the macho jerk. It's a guy who's like my way or the highway, who's a bit dominating, just thinks he rules everything and should be able to get what he wants and he takes what he wants and doesn't really care about the impact on other people. And these are guys who in a lot of ways are powerful leaders, but they're not connected to the people around them and they're not connected to the planet they're part of. And we have, you know, countless examples of what happens when men get into positions of power or just do what they want, disconnected from their hearts. They can abuse the planet, they can abuse children, they can abuse women, they can abuse other men. And so that my way or the highway, no heart kind of man who's just a bit of a jerk. Many men try to do that and it doesn't work, causes harm. And then there's a whole bunch of men that you know, are raised by those men or see those men in the culture and decide, I don't want to be that. I don't want to be a guy that causes harm, makes other people feel unsafe. And so they swing the pendulum to the other way, to the so called nice guy. I'm the guy who's just going to try to make everyone else feel safe and okay and I don't want to make anyone feel uncomfortable. So these guys are often highly conflict avoidant, very codependent, have a hard time asking for what they want or what they need and they suffer in their own way, often from resentment, not feeling like they're getting what they want in life, and often just feeling like doormats in the world. And then there's the third category, which, you know, I sometimes kind of call the grandfatherly one. But it can show up for anyone. And it's just the traditional kind of very stoic man who again, just locks everything deep down inside and never talks about it. You know, shows up for work, shows up for his family, is a man of duty, but never reveals his internal experience. And these men often self medicate, right, with alcohol or these days, weed, or different, different forms of this and end up suffering. And the consequence of all three of these kind of outdated models of masculinity is men are in pain. And, you know, it's something like three out of four suicides tend to be men. And I think it's for these reasons that all of these really ask men to not be their full selves and then to do so in isolation and they suffer. So that's where a lot of men come to me and come to this work is they want to be able to show up in the world in a healthy, more modern form of masculinity and to be a man in a way that doesn't have any of the limits of these old archetypes.

Host (Jenny's safe space): So what is healthy masculinity and mature masculinity looks like to you now?

Jason Lange: Yeah. So the healthy version of all of this, an integrated man, as we call it, a conscious man, is a man who really has access to three important things, as I say. One, he's app. He's absolutely able to just get grounded and relaxed and present in his body in the moment. He's connected to his lower body. His power, his desire, yes. His sexuality, his capacity to say no. But then in addition to that, he's also present in his heart. He has an open heart. He's able to feel not only what he himself is feeling, but the people around him are feeling. He's able to attune, which means he can actually come into contact and tune into what he's feeling and what other people are feeling. He's sensitive and not sensitive in just that he sits around crying kind of way a lot of guys think, but sensitive in that he's feeling quite a bit. And he uses that to help him make decisions. And then the third piece is he's worked on and he knows how to use his awareness, or in another way to put this, his focus. He's able to stay focused on what he wants to have his focus on so many men get lost in rumination or overthinking and have no control, particularly in this age of distractions and notifications and social media and phones and all that, has no control over where his focus is. So a healthy modern man has a balance of both power in his body and sensitivity in his heart. It's not an either or thing, and he's able to control where his focus is. If he wants to put his attention on you, he can put his attention on you and hold it there. If he wants to put his attention on his children, he can do that. On work, he can do that. He's able to stay focused while being grounded in his body and open in his heart. And a man who can do all three of those things is a very rarefied man these days that people want to be around a man who can do that. His nervous system, his presence actually relaxes the nervous system of everyone around him. Men who do this work become more trustable. They make more money, their kids want to be around them more, their intimate partners want to be around them more. And they're just highly desired leaders for all of these reasons.

Host (Jenny's safe space): Interesting. So, jc, a lot of men grow up learning to suppress emotions or handle everything alone. So how does that conditioning affect men later in life?

Jason Lange: Say that one more time.

Host (Jenny's safe space): Okay, I said a lot of men grow up learning to suppress emotions or handle everything alone. So how does that conditioning affect men later in life?

Jason Lange: Yeah, this is so great. It really catches up with men. And again, when we're taught from a young age to not be in our bodies, to not be in our emotions, and to just override it with our heads. The challenge most men then come into is when they feel bad inside, physically or emotionally, or sometimes mentally. They don't know how to talk about it, they don't know how to name it, and thus they can't get help around it. So what most men do is when they're not feeling good inside, they turn to something on the outside to try to make them feel better. Right. We've talked about a few of them. It can be alcohol, it can be. It can be weed, drugs, porn and masturbation, overworking, overeating, tv. They try to change their inner state with some outer object. And the challenge with that is, yes, it can provide some temporary relief, but it never actually gets to the root of the cause, which is often some kind of emotional or physical pain. So guys just keep ignoring it. And this really starts to catch up to men, in particular, around middle age, when our Bodies start to change, our hormones start to change, our available levels of energy start to change. And what I've discovered in years and years of doing this work, both in myself and now other men, is anytime we're not feeling an emotion, we're avoiding some kind of emotional experience or discomfort inside of ourselves. It takes energy. It actually takes energy to hold it inside. Right? So I often tell the story if I walked up to a young boy who was crying and I said the unfortunate, all too common phrase, stop crying. How the little boy does that is he tightens up his belly, tightens up his body, holds his breath and locks it inside. Now when we do that, over a lifetime, there's an accumulation of all these tightenings inside of ourselves. And it takes energy to hold all that back. And so men, as they get older, get fatigued, get depressed, get irritable, get autoimmune disorders. And these are often all downstream of not feeling and not being able to emotionally express ourselves. And what I see as men get into community and learn to come into contact with their emotions and not fear them, but actually become present to them, what happens is they release all that pent up energy and it becomes available for them to once again take on the things they want to take on in their lives. Their bodies soften, their voices deepening, color returns to their face, they brighten up with vitality. So it's a huge thing that men are not taught how to feel and not taught how to communicate that with each other. And this does catch up to men who ultimately, when the pain is too much for some men, that's when they consider, you know, suicide or ending their lives. And so learning to become emotionally present with ourselves as men is. And how to process this will make your life better. And you'll feel a lot more empowered as a man because then instead of just avoiding emotions inside yourself, you'll know how to turn towards them fearlessly so that you can feel what you need to feel and take the actions you need to take in your life.

Host (Jenny's safe space): Interesting. So do you think many men mistake emotional numbness for strength?

Jason Lange: Yes, absolutely. This is kind of that stoic ideal I was talking about that, well, if I just don't feel it, that makes me tough. And here's the thing a lot of guys don't get. It actually doesn't make us tough, it makes us fragile and brittle. Because then we're constantly posturing ourselves and avoiding feeling. And I tell this to guys all the time. You, you tell me who's more courageous, the man who's so terrified of his fear, his grief, or his shame that he'll do anything he possibly can to avoid it. Or the man who's brave enough to just sit with it and be with the emotion and ask for help. And so it's very common for men to confuse being numb and disconnected with being tough. And in the work we do, we. We flip that on its head, that to be strong, to be resilient, means we can take anything that comes our way and be present with it, metabolize it. And the more we're able to turn towards emotional discomfort as men, the more we can effectively lead ourselves and the less we need to rely on these external substances to help us regulate. And they've shown. Right. The consequences of men holding all of their pain inside and not sharing it is that those men do report feeling lonely. And men who report feeling lonely die faster. It's as dangerous as smoking a pack of cigarettes a day, being lonely. That's how detrimental the lack of social connection is to our body, minds. We are social creatures, and we need connection even as men

Host (Jenny's safe space): trusted. So. And, Jason, you are also a satisfied, no more Mr. Nice Guy Coach. So what does the nice guy pattern actually looks like in men?

Host (Jenny's safe space): Oh, interesting. So for men listening right now, who feels blowing, disconnected or unsure of who they are becoming? So what would you want them to hear today?

Jason Lange: Yeah, just that for so many men, they think if they're not living the life they want or they're feeling lonely, or they're not hitting their goals or they feel like a failure, that it, it's something wrong with them. And I'm here to tell you it's often not the case. We just need to be more resourced as men. You can't do everything alone. And getting into community, getting support, asking for help, learning how to be vulnerable, these things don't make you weaker, they make you stronger. And social capital. Right. Which means what kind of relationships do I have around me in my life that can support me when I need help? That is one of the fastest growing currencies in the planet in my mind. Meaning no matter how tough you are as a man or tough you think you are, there will be A time for every man where his body will fail him. Could be illness, old age, old could be accident. But there will be a time you won't just be able to push through. And it's that, that moment. It's going to reveal to you, what kind of relationships do I have around me who's willing to help me? And this is the kind of investment men can start making now that we grow faster and farther when we're in deep relationship with other people that can support us and hold us accountable. And I've seen it hundreds of times now that when men switch from this lone wolf, I got to do it all by myself framework to, hey, what I need is a team of men around me that care about me and that love me and that hold me accountable to the things I want to do. When they get that support, it's like a rocket ship, their life takes off.

Host (Jenny's safe space): Interesting. So briefly, JC so what does being a man mean to you now compared to when you first started this journey?

Jason Lange: Absolutely, yeah. Just being a man now means first and foremost, as I often put it, means taking responsibility for my pain means not pushing my pain out onto other people and pretending like it's all their fault or I'm a victim to it. Now, we're all victimized at some capacity in our life, but only we have choice as to how to respond around that. And more and more what I'm seeing is the men I trust the most in this world, as leaders, as fathers, as husbands, as friends, are men who take responsibility for their pain. Hey, I'm in pain here. Here's where I get angry easily. Here's where I collapse into my shame. And rather than not taking responsibility for that, I'm going to say, that's mine to deal with. It's not yours to deal with. Mine to deal with. So I'm going to get the support I need to be able to do that, to be more mature, present and engaged in life in the way I want to be. And so more and more, it's about men who can take responsibility for their pain and in doing that, can empower other people, actually give power to other people to get more of what they want. Those, to me, are. That's what it really means to be a man these days.

Host (Jenny's safe space): Thank you so much, Jason. This has been such a thoughtful and honest conversation. Thank you for bringing depth, clarity and compassion to a topic that so many men quickly struggle with. And to everyone listening, remember this strength is not about carrying everything alone. Sometimes the strongest thing a person can do is allow themselves to be seen, supported and connected. Thank you once more, Jason, and do have a lovely day.

Jason Lange: Great. Thank you much.